William O'Rourke, "Coach" to many ...

Coach "Bill" O'Rourke
William O'Rourke, Bill O'Rourke,
Coach O'Rourke, Coach,

Please send your Coach O'Rourke stories, facts, history, news clips, references, photographs, etc.
to Editor@UpperWindpower.com

Wish list:

[ ] email for daughter and grandchildren (will keep private) Old email does not work.
[ ] Team rosters for all his teams (emails will be kept private)
[ ] Timeline of events in his life
[ ] Public documents
[ ] Photographs
[ ] Scans of Culver City Jr. and Sr. High yearbooks for Coach, each year.
[ ] His own schooling yearbooks and news points

Sunday, 8/5/2012 at 1 pm on the PVHS track: Bronze Plaque Dedication Ceremony:
Ceremony honoring our Legendary Coach "Bill" O'Rourke as the first inductee into the PVHS Track & Cross Country Wall of Fame!!!!!

Don Hurzeler has graciously agreed to be our Master of Ceremony!!!! (author of book The Way Up )
(The Way Up: How to Keep Your Career Moving in the Right Direction)

1984 Olympics High Jump Official:
"Today we have officials in what we call the pre-association. We have the national officials and then we have the certified officials who are called masters, who earn their way. They have to be in the organization five or six years, take tests, and be rated and evaluated by master officials. I have a staff right now of maybe 10 or 15 top officials that are doing a great job in clinics and in evaluating officials. We have individuals like Al Pina in the long jump and Jim Carson. We have Dr. Dave Schwartz in the high jump along with Bill O'Rourke."
http://www.la84foundation.org/6oic/OralHistory/OHClentzos.pdf

Photos:

1961: http://www.pvcrosscountry.com/PV_Cross_Country/1961.html
1961             1962
1963                  1964
1965     1966

PVHS Palos Verdes High School teacher and coach
- http://www.pvcrosscountry.com/PV_Cross_Country/Program_History.html See all.
- "One of the reasons behind the success of the Palos Verdes cross country program has been a lineage of top-notch coaches. The cross country program was founded in 1961 by Coach Bill O’Rourke and then followed by Coach Terry Wallace."
High jump official at Olympic Games
- http://www.la84foundation.org/6oic/OralHistory/OHClentzos.pdf
Rome Olympics
Don Hurzeler...old hurdler and captain of the 1965 PVHS track team (under Coach O'Rourke)
Culver City High School teacher and coach
Culver City Junior High School teacher and coach
His college education
His high school education
His daughter and grandchildren: Marylynne Pierce (need current email)
His birth

In a message dated 5/15/2006 6:13:35 P.M. Pacific Standard Time, Joe Faust wrote:

On the way to a meet, I confessed to Coach O'Rourke that I was sick, but wanted deeply to still jump.

I asked him if it would be OK to jump. He heard the symptoms and explained that following through with the meet would be just fine.

I broke my P.R. at that meet.

A strong dimension that was appreciated only after some years following high school graduation has to do with Coach's

professionalism. He and I had 6 very profound years careful coaching. The manner in which he released me to college

coaches was very professional; he kept an appropriate distance. Easily he was the foundation for my breaking world age records

and getting an Olympic spot; but he so well released me to Coach Ducky Drake of UCLA and Coach Coker of Occidental College,

so that I could obtain the full benefit of maturing with the new situation. Gradually I began to appreciate how professional he was.

Judy Marshall, a grade ahead of me, knew my heart deeply; she spearheaded a fundraising throughout Culver City that gave over a thousand dollars to be the core of the money that permitted Coach to attend the Rome 1960 Olympic Games. Coach I bumped into each other briefly in Rome; he stayed with his professionalism and enjoyed his sport. Judy contracted MS and complications moved her to an early age 51 passing; she had married Fred Martin and they had two sons who graduated from college; they lived in Grass Valley in northern California; she changed the spelling of her name to "Judi" in her marriage. Judy and I were engaged for a short while. Coach and Judi will are getting all the stories straight now.

Coach had notes on each of us; he planned programs to fit our individual needs. And teased us with strong goals. He followed our individual progress. I guess he started with us when he was about 28 years old. His dedication must have been a pressure that I only later began to appreciate.

My college steps: 30 days at UCLA. Semester and 20 days at Occidental College. One and one-half years at Mt. San Antonio College. Semester at USC. Summer session at LATTC. Two weeks at Cal Poly Pomona. Quarter at UCLA again. Several years at CSULA...graduating with B.A. Mathematics; then 70% of a masters degree program in pure math and 95% of the teacher-credential program. Retired from LAUSD without pension (short teaching time). Taught math for 4 years at CSULA on part time status. Worked in many capacities in aerospace industry. College of hard knocks as a publisher/printer in the hang gliding arena. Made one paid-commercial as actor (shower and flying hang glider) for Dial Soap.

Best of all: three children with trackstar Joanne Radaich: Joseph, Joy, Jennifer. Two grandchildren: Hanz and Zoe.

And to each I have told of my gratitude for Coach O'Rourke in my life.

http://www.la84foundation.org/3ce/CoachingManuals/LA84trackfield.pdf
http://wikibin.org/articles/palos-verdes-cross-country.html "The cross country program was founded in 1961 by coach Bill O’Rourke"
http://www.culverhighalumni.org/this-n-that.html

Timeline (please send notes to editor@upperwindpower.com )

Parents
Birth
Education
College
Competition
Teaching and coaching
Summer day camp counselor
Family, marriage, child
Divorce
Culver City Junior High School
Culver City High School
Palos Verdes High School
High jump official
High jump official in the 1984 Olympics
Death
Obituary
Honoring

Schenectady Gazette, Thursday, July 28, 1960, p. 35.

??? Facts are off. June 20, 1960, page 16. No pole vault for Faust. But sentence here is correct: "Upcn being graduated from Culver City High School Joe was awarded the Dykstra Scholarship one of the most prized at Westwood un A student he had the grades to qualify But after one semester at UCLA lie transferred to Oxy That's like losing your No 1 draft choice" Coach O'Rourke let Faust be appropriately mixing with new coaches.